Record number of internationals working in Denmark

Figures have jumped nearly 45 percent since 2008

Christian Wenande

Feb 21, 2017

Over the course of 2016, a total of 336,840 international people worked in Denmark – a record number since the labour market data collector jobindsats.dk began gathering figures in 2008.

The 2016 mark is almost 45 percent more than the 232,749 who worked in Denmark in 2008 and amounts to 12 percent of Denmark’s total workforce. Experts contend the trend will only continue.

“My bid is that the development will keep going and that companies will continue to get their labour force from a variety of areas in the coming years,” Jens Arnholtz, a labour market researcher at the University of Copenhagen, told Ugebladet A4.

READ MORE: More construction workers getting injured in Denmark

Polished effort
The largest group of foreign citizens employed in Denmark worked in the cleaning industry, where nearly 63,000 plied their trade in 2016. Second on the list was the industrial sector with over 44,000, followed by hotels and restaurants (40,945), trade (38,652), the health and social sector (31,821), construction (31,602), transport (24,514) and education (21,344).

Poland supplied the most international workers in Denmark with 47,728, followed by Germany (26,949), Romania (26,585), Sweden (20,436) and Lithuania (16,456).

“The foreign workers are helping to provide the companies the necessary employees so they can keep production in Denmark,” said Arnholtz.

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